Thursday, September 08, 2005

Stephen King wants to kill you. (And he has a very good reason to do it...)

Wanna be a short-lived character in a Stephen King novel? How about the name on a tombstone in a Neil Gaiman children's book? Dave Eggers? Lemony Snicket? If you have the cash, you can be immortalized in hard cover glory, courtesy of these charity auctions on eBay. Each of these authors, plus several others, is ready to incorporate you into an upcoming project if you are among the highest bidders. Proceeds from each of these auctions will support the very worthy First Amendment Project.

It would so rock to be a character in a Stephen King book. (Especially one that King offs in a particularly gruesome manner.) And, it would be great to support the Project in the process. Alas, it is not meant to be, cherie. Someone with deep pockets will have to be King's victim.

I did have the distinct "pleasure" of having my porn star name appear in a 1998 episode of "ER." Back in the day, I used to hang around in the alt.tv.homicide Usenet group. That seems like a lifetime ago now. David Mills, one of the writers for "Homicide: Life on the Street", used to lurk in the group, and, apparently, he was greatly amused by a thread about group members' porn star names. In addition to his Homicide duties, Mills also wrote episodes of NYPD Blue, ER, and The Corner. Eventually, he popped up and said that he would be using some of our amusing porn-ish revelations in a script he was writing for ER. Sure enough, my porn star name appeared in the episode when it showed in November of that year, in a scene where the members of the hospital staff reveal their porn names. I had company over that evening, and I was pouring drinks when that scene came on - I nearly spilled a entire pitcher of frozen margaritas all over the sofa, I was so surprised.

I won't tell you which silly name is mine. If you catch that episode in reruns on TNT, you'll just have to guess. Good luck!

Ah, moments of delicious, infinitesimal network fame. Little things that make groundlings of my ilk smile like idiots. The closest most of us will get to top billing in our lives. And that's cool, in a very silly way.

Now, if I get my real name to appear in some show - over a loudspeaker, on a blackboard in a police station, on a list of People of Dubious Character, that sort of thing - well, then I'll be happy. It's like a walk-on part for the less telegenic among us.

Until then, I'll just be Merujo out here. And something very silly and kinky for .3 seconds in cable reruns once every few months...